Concussive Force
by Kelcor
Summary: Why was Jack acting so odd/OOC in the first few episodes of Season 2? This is what I came up with after rewatching over the past couple weeks. Mostly just Mac&Jack, but the other main characters make some cameo appearances. HurtJack/ComfortingMac AND HurtMac/ComfortingJack Rated T to be safe.


A/N I apologize for my absence. I'm currently working hard to meet the deadline on book three of my YA series, so I haven't been publishing on here as much—that said, I couldn't get this out of my head. The way they wrote Jack in the first few episodes of S2 has always kind of annoyed me. I'd expect him to be a bit OOC in Fanfiction, but not on the actual show! Anyway, this is the possible explanation I came up with after rewatching the first two seasons over the past couple weeks. Just a quick one shot. I hope y'all like it! Not beta'd, so any mistakes are mine. Please PM me if you notice any, and I'll correct them asap. :-) ~Kelcor

A/N 2 Reviews are like strawberries dipped in chocolate! :-D

Concussive Force

MacGyver watched with fondness the familiar commotion currently playing itself out in his living room and kitchen. He and the team had just finished processing the scene after Murdoc's latest escape the day before. It was a miracle no one sustained any serious injuries.

Mac still couldn't believe how they'd played right into that psychopath's hands. Again.

Needless to say, no one really felt like celebrating, but Mac was determined to not let Murdoc take even one more thing from him. And that included the team's tradition of having dinner together after an especially difficult mission. Even failed ones.

Bozer was in the kitchen preparing a roast chicken with all the trimmings, while Riley and Cage debated which movie they'd be watching first. Matty had to finish up some paperwork first but had promised to make her way over as soon as she was done.

The only person missing was Jack. And, boy, was his absence noticeable. Jack's humor had taken a slightly darker turn lately—his story about stealing a body from the morgue to use as a Halloween prop when he was a kid had been a testament to that—but his jokes always seemed able to pull Mac out of his head when he most needed it.

And his current search for his dad made that need an almost constant occurrence. He felt bad for neglecting to appreciate Jack's role in his life while searching for his dad, and he planned on proving that to his friend over the days to come.

Although, Cage pointed out he had clearly been seeking Jack's support subconsciously when she spied the receipt for the bottle of wine he'd been drinking when Jack had surprised him in Paris. Mac hadn't even noticed the name of the café he'd randomly chosen to watch for any sign of the professor who'd been in contact with his father years earlier.

_Café Jacques. _He still shook his head about that one and couldn't help but wonder if Jack had noticed. He made a mental note to bring it up in conversation someday. The trick was doing that without reminding them both of the fight they'd had while sitting outside that same café.

The memory of the words he'd dared to say to his best friend still stung; he could only hope the same wasn't true for Jack.

Despite everything going on around him, Mac was unnerved by the quietness of it all. There was never a dull moment when Jack Dalton was around, true, but it was more than that. Mac just _wanted _his friend to be there.

Sensing his mood spiraling into the annoyingly sentimental, MacGyver quickly grabbed his keys off the kitchen counter and headed for the door.

"And where do you think you're goin'?" Bozer demanded. "My culinary masterpiece is just about ready to be adored and revered by all!"

"Yes, and it smells delicious, Boze," Mac assured him. "So delicious, in fact, I think one more person should be here to enjoy it." He could almost hear the collective sigh around him. Was he really that transparent?

"Jack said he had a headache, Mac," Cage reminded him.

"Yeah, Mac," Riley cut in. "We all know he's been getting a lot of those lately—"

"I still think he's the one who emptied my bottle of ibuprofen," Bozer accused. "Not that I mind, but the dude could at least admit to it instead of denying up and down even taking one."

"—maybe you should just let him sleep," Riley finished.

"When have you ever known Jack to pass up food for a headache?" Mac asked with a smirk.

"He does seem to appreciate a good meal," Cage agreed.

Bozer's eyebrows climbed toward his hairline. "What do you mean 'good'? This roast chicken is going to be . . . "

Chuckling, Mac left his friends to argue over the correct combination of adjectives on their own, while he departed to haul Jack out of his apartment and back to Mac's place for supper.

And if he still wasn't feeling well after that, he could crash there for the night. Mac might even take the sofa and let Jack have his bed in deference to his headache.

* * *

"Hey, Jack!" Mac called out, using his key to open the apartment door and slipping inside. He'd half expected to find his best friend stretched out on his couch with his eyes closed, listening to the audio for Die Hard while the scenes played out behind his eyelids, but the living room was empty.

Mac continued on toward the bedroom. He almost opened the door, but he'd already seen far more of Jack's nether regions after the frostbite incident than he'd ever wanted to see—or ever wanted to see again! Instead, he knocked loudly on the wooden frame before slowly opening the door.

"Jack? You decent?" The silence on the other side of the threshold was concerning. Jack was not only a skilled agent but a well-trained Delta Commando. His instincts to always be on alert ran deep. Heart rate amping up significantly, Mac pushed the door open all the way and flicked on the light.

"Turn it off!" came the growled response from the other side of the room.

His own instincts kicking in, Mac immediately complied, plunging the bedroom into darkness once again. "Jack? You okay, buddy?" As his eyes adjusted to the dark, Mac saw the outline of his friend sitting in a chair in the far corner. "Why're you sitting in the dark?"

MacGyver remembered not too long ago when Jack had walked in on him in a similar setting after Mac had played the role of Murdoc-the-Assassin for a day and was slowly coming apart at the seams. In Mac's case, he was trying to hide himself—and his quart of vodka—from the world in general, and from Jack in particular. "Are you hung over?" he hedged.

"No!" Jack snapped. "I just wanna be left alone, is that too much to ask?"

Whoa. Mac couldn't remember Jack ever using that tone with him, even back when they'd first met in the sandbox and basically despised each other.

"What do you want, Mac?"

The question was asked in such a way that it was clear Jack was only asking to get whatever it was over with so he could go back to . . . sitting alone in the dark?

When he didn't respond right away, Jack snapped again. "Out with it, kid."

Mac was floundering. What was wrong with Jack? "I, uh, thought you might want to come over for Bozer's famous roast chicken dinner. It's not the same without you, man."

Jack scoffed. "Come on, Mac. Let's be real here, okay? We both know I'm the crazy uncle no one wants at the family gathering."

"What?" That sounded vaguely familiar. Cage. Cage had said that on the casino job. Crap! The comms must've still been on. "Jack, that was just a joke—"

"Whatever, man. You know what? I'm tired of going back and forth between crazy uncle and helicopter parent, anyway. Just leave me alone, okay?"

The anger had dissipated, and Jack just sounded tired now. Maybe that was it. Maybe he was just overtired. He'd had a rough month, what with trying to help Mac find his dad and dealing with the bad guys and terrorists on almost a daily basis.

"O-okay," Mac said slowly, still somewhat unsettled—not to mention a little hurt—by Jack's tone. Regardless of how tired he'd been in the past, he'd _never _been like this. But if he wanted to be left alone, who was Mac to argue?

He turned to leave, but this just didn't sit right with him. What if Jack was hurt and trying to hide it from Mac? Or what if someone was holding a gun to Jack's head, forcing him to say whatever was necessary to get Mac to leave?

Suddenly, Mac's imagination kicked into high gear portraying for him a picture of his best friend bleeding to death because Mac was chased off too easily.

Not willing to risk it, Mac flipped the switch on the wall, flooding the room with light. Everything went downhill from there. Very, very quickly.

One instant, Mac was relieved to see there was no villain pointing a gun at Jack, and no blood that he could see on Jack's clothing. The next, Jack was crying out and falling out of the chair, crashing to the floor on his knees, hands clamped over his skull as if he was keeping his head from exploding right then and there.

"Jack!" MacGyver ran to his friend. He knelt beside him, prying the man's hands from either side of his head and trying to see his eyes. "Jack, talk to me, man! What is it? What's wrong?"

"My head," Jack whimpered. And dang if that didn't tear at Mac's heart. Never in all the years he'd known Jack had he ever heard the man make that sound. Jack grabbed Mac's arm in a painful grip. "Make it stop, Mac! Please!"

"Okay, buddy, okay," Mac tried to assure him while trying to keep his own heart from pounding out of his chest. "Hold on for me, okay? Just hold on!"

He pulled out his cell phone and called Matty. She answered on the first ring. "I just need another few minutes, Blondie. I promise—"

"Matty, it's Jack," Mac interrupted, and his panic must have come through loud and clear because his boss' tone changed immediately.

"What is it, Mac? What's wrong?"

"I don't know," Mac admitted painfully. "But you need to send an ambulance to Jack's apartment right away!" Jack cried out again, and Mac pulled him in tighter against his chest. "Matty, hurry!"

* * *

Mac paced back and forth across the length of the waiting room at Phoenix Medical.

"He's going to be fine, Baby Einstein," Matty assured him, adding under her breath a heartfelt, "He has to be."

Before Mac could comment, Jack's doctor strolled into the room, clipboard held firmly in her hand. The look on her face had Mac's heart plummeting into his stomach.

"How is he, Janice?" Matty asked her.

Janice's sympathetic gaze flicked from Mac to Matty and back again. "Tests have found a concerning amount of swelling on Jack's brain. Has he suffered any injuries over the past few weeks that could have led to a severe concussion?"

The worst part about perfect-recall was being able to remember every single punch and kick delivered to his best friend's head, concussive force explosions Mac himself had initiated, not to mention the booby-trapped floor he fell through and the cliff he fell off, and their Humvee being torpedoed and flipping upside down . . .

When Mac relayed to the doctor all the injuries over the past few weeks—everything from Cuba to Azerbaijan to Goat Island to right there in Los Angeles—her brows had inched up higher and higher with each admission. She glanced at her clipboard. "I'm not seeing any of that on his file."

Mac smirked dryly. "That doesn't surprise me. Despite all the times Jack gets on my case for not reporting one of my injuries, he rarely reports any of his own unless there's blood involved. Even then it has to be spurting, not just leaking, as he so aptly puts it."

At Janice's look of shock, Matty explained, "Jack is a Delta Commando first and foremost. His unspoken motto for himself is 'Suck it up and walk it off'."

"Well, he won't be walking this off," Janice told them. "We've put him into a medically induced coma with the hope his brain will heal itself. If that doesn't work, we'll have no choice but to operate."

Mac was stunned. Brain surgery? "Can—Can we see him?"

"Not yet," the doctor informed him gently. "We're still getting him settled into his room. I'll send a nurse down to get you once he's ready for visitors."

"Thank you, Janice," Mac heard Matty say softly. Once the doctor was gone, he felt his boss' hand slip into his, and he gripped it hard.

"Matty—" he couldn't say anything else as his throat tightened with suppressed tears.

She squeezed his hand in response. "I stand by my words, Mac. Dalton will be fine. He's too stubborn not to be."

The elevator dinged, and Riley, Bozer, and Cage rushed into the hallway. As soon as they saw Mac and Matty they strode toward them.

"How is he?" Riley asked, her distress clear.

Mac sat down, allowing Matty to fill everyone in on what they knew so far. He put his face in his hands, trying desperately to get control of himself.

"Swelling of the brain?" Bozer asked. "But wouldn't there be signs of that?"

"Usually," Cage said. "They can be subtle, though."

"There were signs," Mac muttered, voice muffled by his hands. "And I ignored them."

"Mac—" Riley began.

He surged to his feet, tears burning his eyes. "I should have known something was wrong when he got so belligerent with me when Riley was on her first solo mission, or when he tried to grab some of the dirty money from the casino vault. That wasn't Jack, and I knew it, yet I chose to ignore it."

"We all did, Blondie," Matty said gently.

"He always taunts the bad guys to get them to hit him instead of me. _Always. _He's been having headaches, memory issues." Mac knew his voice was rising incrementally with each example of his failure to protect his best friend, but he hadn't been given enough time to compartmentalize . . . _brain surgery?_ "He's been hurting, and I ran off to Paris!" he exclaimed, slamming his fist into the closest wall in anger.

"Mac!" Bozer grabbed him by the arm, hauling him away from the wall and inserting himself between it and Mac.

The gentle clearing of a throat brought everyone's attention to the nurse standing a few feet away. "I was asked to come down here to tell you Agent Dalton can accept visitors now, but just one," he informed them.

"That'll be me," Mac said, immediately stepping forward, knowing none of his friends would argue.

"Sure thing," the nurse responded. "After we check out that hand of yours."

"It's fine," Mac insisted. "I just want to see my partner."

"You should've thought about that before doing something that could very well have broken your hand in front of someone whose job it is to put your health ahead of your 'wants'."

Mac opened his mouth to protest, but Matty stopped him. "It'll only take a few minutes, MacGyver. Jack isn't going anywhere for a little while."

"Besides," Cage added, "how do you think Jack will feel when he wakes up and sees your bruised and bloody knuckles?"

The newest member of their team had a point. Still, he had the distinct feeling the operative who specialized in getting into peoples' heads was pulling his strings, effectively playing him like a banjo. The thought that she cared enough to do so was touching; the thought that she was able to manipulate him so easily was annoying.

* * *

Mac refused to leave Jack's room for three days, he barely slept, hardly even ate. On the third day, he couldn't remember falling asleep, but he woke up with his forehead pressed into Jack's shoulder. He didn't move for a moment, wondering what had woken him. Then he felt fingers sifting through his hair, and he looked up to see Jack staring down at him.

"Jack!" he said excitedly, sitting upright so quickly the room spun a bit. He could feel his eyes fill with relief, and maybe a bit of guilt.

"Hey, bud," Jack mumbled. "What 'appened?"

"Your big brain got bigger than it was supposed to be," Mac teased, trying to lighten the mood before things got embarrassing.

Jack didn't take the bait, though. Instead, he took Mac's bandaged hand in one of his, gripping the wrist when Mac tried to pull away. "What'd you do, kiddo?"

"I should've seen the signs," Mac whispered, almost against his will.

"What signs?"

"You know what, you're tired," Mac deflected. "We can talk about this later."

"What signs?" Jack asked again, like a dog with a bone.

"Multiple concussions, Jack. _Multiple. _They had to put you in a coma to bring down the swelling. If that didn't work, they were going to operate!"

Jack eyed him for several long moments. Mac couldn't decide if he was gauging Mac's emotional state or trying to decipher what he'd just been told. Then his hand went to his head, and he sighed with relief.

"What?" Mac asked.

"I was scared they shaved all my hair off."

"Seriously, Jack? I tell you that you almost needed brain surgery, and your hair is your first concern?"

"I've lost enough as it is, bro. I need to guard what I've got left with my life."

Mac shook his head, chuckling softly. Leave it to Jack to get him laughing when he was so close to crying.

"So. Coma, huh?"

"Yeah," Mac whispered, gaze moving to the door at the other side of the room. He should really let someone know Jack was awake.

"How long?" Jack asked him.

"Three days." Mac tried to keep the exhaustion out of his voice, but he wasn't sure it was working.

"Hey," Jack said, nudging Mac to get his attention again. "Does that make you Sandra Bullock in this scenario?"

"Wh-What?" Mac asked. Part of him wanted to laugh again, but another part began to wonder if the swelling had gone down after all.

"That movie, dude! While You Were Sleeping! Just please don't tell me that you're secretly in love with me because that would be awkward. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love ya' like a brother, but that's as far as it'll ever go."

This time, Mac's laugh came straight from the gut. He laughed so hard he didn't realize the tears started until it was too late, and Jack reached out and wiped the wetness off his cheek with the pad of his thumb.

Mac startled back, but Jack still had a firm grip on his wrist holding him in place. "I should get a nurse—" he said, rising to his feet.

"C'mere, kiddo," Jack said softly, tugging him closer.

"Jack . . . "

"C'mon, man. I need this as much as you do."

Mac didn't have the willpower to refuse his friend after all that happened. He allowed himself to be pulled down until they were chest to chest, Mac's chin resting on Jack's opposite shoulder.

He held his breath and grit his teeth through the embrace, determined not to fall apart, praying it would be over soon. It wasn't long before he felt himself approaching his breaking point. He tried to pull away, but Jack refused to let go.

"I told you, I'm gonna be a helicopter parent whether you like it or not, kiddo. Remember?"

What Mac remembered was the way he treated Jack in Paris shortly before that conversation. The thought that he almost hadn't gotten a chance to make it up to him pushed Mac over the brink. "I'm so sorry, Jack! For everything!"

"Hey, hey, you got nothin' to be sorry for, brother. This is all on me. I know the signs of concussion, and I ignored 'em. Besides, I don't remember everything that happened before my head felt like it was gonna explode, but I'm pretty dang sure I should be the one apologizin' to you! I didn't mean any of what I said, kid. You know that right?"

Mac nodded his head against Jack's shoulder. "Neither did I," Mac blurted.

"Now you lost me, bud. What is it that you said?"

"I mean in Paris," he explained. "I felt like my dad wouldn't let me find him if you were with me. Like you made him feel guilty or something."

"Why would my being there make him feel guilty?"

"Because you've been the father to me that he could never hope to be."

"Awww, bud, if that's true I consider it an honour," Jack said gently, moving one hand up to cup the back of Mac's head. "For the record," hewhispered, "my hair wasn't my first concern."

In that moment, Mac realized this was the guy's game plan all along. He really shouldn't have been surprised.

THE END.


End file.
